"Flavour of gin and tonic could be impacted by climate change, study finds."

 The Guardian reports.

[Juniper] berries have their own regional “terroir” just like wine, depending on rainfall and sunshine, according to the findings, which have been published in the Journal of the Institute of Brewing....

“For a multibillion-pound industry, which is increasingly focused on consistency and quality for its discerning consumers, this represents a risk.”

Maybe you have enough toys.

I'm trying to read "Trump, on Tariffs, Says ‘Maybe the Children Will Have 2 Dolls Instead of 30’/At the end of a cabinet meeting, the president allowed for the possibility that trade war could disrupt supply chains" (NYT).

This reminds me of what those on the left used to say to us around the theme of global warming: We have too much stuff already. We should think small. Less plastic. Consume less. Lighten your carbon footprint. 

The NYT writer, Shawn McCreesh, is offended that ordinary people are asked to do with less by "the billionaire, crypto-salesman, golf-club-operating, Palm Beach-by-way-of-Fifth Avenue president with the golden office and the golden triplex apartment."

Reminds me of how righties would criticize the experts and celebrities for living in mansions and flying halfway around the world in private jets to hobnob at climate change conventions.

"Similar ice ridges appear elsewhere, including on Lake Mendota in Wisconsin."

I'm reading "In Japan, an Iceless Lake and an Absent God Sound an Ancient Warning/For centuries, residents in central Japan have chronicled a mysterious natural phenomenon in winter. They see its disappearance as a bad omen" (NYT).

First, people were awakened at night by a loud rumbling. Dawn broke to reveal its source: a long, narrow ridge of jagged ice that had mysteriously arisen across [Lake Suwa's] surface, meandering like the spiked back of a twisting dragon. 

This was the Miwatari, meaning the sacred crossing, which local belief held was left by a passing god of Japan’s native Shinto belief.

"By overhauling massive rules on the endangerment finding, the social cost of carbon and similar issues, we are driving a dagger through the heart of climate-change religion..."

"... and ushering in America’s Golden Age. These actions will roll back trillions of dollars in regulatory costs and hidden taxes. As a result, the cost of living for American families will decrease, and essentials such as buying a car, heating your home and operating a business will become more affordable. Our actions will also reignite American manufacturing, spreading economic benefits to communities. The EPA will continue to protect human health and the environment while unleashing America’s full potential. That means reconsidering the regulations that have restricted every sector of the economy, such as the illegal Clean Power Plan 2.0, Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, and Particulate Matter 2.5 levels. Under President Trump guidance, the EPA also has ended the electric-vehicle mandate that threatened to destroy America’s auto industry and made cars cost more...."

Writes Lee Zeldin in "EPA Ends the ‘Green New Deal’/We’re keeping people and the environment safe while overhauling rules that stifled our full potential" (Wall Street Journal).

"The Biden administration used so-called 'climate equity' to justify handouts of billions of dollars to their far-left friends."

"It is my utmost priority to get a handle on every dollar that went out the door in this scheme and once again restore oversight and accountability over these funds. This rush job operation is riddled with conflicts of interest and corruption."

Said EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, quoted by Bari Weiss (at X).

Weiss writes: "The Department of Justice is investigating the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, a $27 billion program that was part of Joe Biden’s $740 billion Inflation Reduction Act. Created in the spring of 2023, and managed by the Environmental Protection Agency, the fund was supposed to be a 'first-of-its-kind' program to address the climate crisis while revitalizing communities that it considered 'historically left behind.' But it appears little of the $27 billion revitalized anything—except the coffers of a range of environmental nonprofits associated with former Obama and Biden administration officials.."

The performance of power in the arena and in the Oval Office.

Trump had a busy day yesterday, but let's focus on the showmanship in the signing of all those orders. First, on a little red-carpeted stage in the Capitol One Arena, he is literally The Man in the Arena (as Theodore Roosevelt put it):

 

He's got the people surrounding him, watching him sign papers at a tiny table, and they're fully engaged in the show he's putting on, as if it's a big boxing match going on there in that little square in the center of the arena. Whoever thought of dramatizing order-signing like that and getting a rowdy crowd to cheer as if it's a sport? 

Later, in the Oval Office, he signed more orders, this time in front of the press elite, and when they ventured questions, he answered — calmly, chattily, seriously, and easily. Joe Biden couldn't even answer one question from the press or get to the end of a single sentence without stumbling, and here's Trump, signing orders — take that, Paris Agreement — and holding a press conference at the same time... and showing no strain, even at the end of a long day of events, and with the Inaugural Ball yet to come:

Is it dangerous — reprehensible? — this showmanship in the exercise of power? Those who hate him and who hate the substance of those orders will, I presume, denounce the theatricality. It's cruel! But he's out there in the open, letting the people see him do his work, using the power he asked them to give him, and doing what he said he would do. What a contrast to Biden who campaigned hidden away in 2020 and who occupied the position of President without ever letting us see that — if! — he was the one doing the work.

After 4 years of The Man in the Basement, we have, once again, The Man in the Arena.

ADDED: Here's how Biden looked, signing his first executive orders — yay, Paris Agreement! — in the Oval Office in 2021. Scroll to 2:30 to hear — muffled behind masks — the first questions from the press. Biden answers one question as we hear aides hustling the reporters out of the room:

"The Progressive Moment Is Over/Four reasons their era has come to an end."

Writes Ruy Teixeira (at Liberal Patriot).

The 4 reasons:

1. Loosening restrictions on illegal immigration was a terrible idea and voters hate it...

2. Promoting lax law enforcement and tolerance of social disorder was a terrible idea and voters hate it....

3. Insisting that everyone should look at all issues through the lens of identity politics was a terrible idea and voters hate it....

4. Telling people fossil fuels are evil and they must stop using them was a terrible idea and voters hate it....

That made me think of this TikTok I saw today, a woman describing what she thinks is "a new breed of conservatives": 

"The proposal would slash fuel burn by 5 to 7% and would reduce the 4% industry contribution to overall climate change, per the research, which is being presented to the United Nations."

From "Scientists want every flight to take up to an hour longer — they say slower speeds are better for the planet" (NY Post).

How about if people just fly 5 to 7% less often?

Or never.

"One celebrated offering is pigeon meat cured in a casing of beeswax and served suspended, like a ham, with the bird’s feathered head intact."

"Another is ice cream made from pig’s blood and filled with a ganache of juniper oil and deer-blood garum. ('Fatty, with a weird umami aftertaste,' in the judgment of a food blogger.) Not all diners appreciate being scolded during their meal. 'I care deeply about climate change, yet I don’t necessarily go to a restaurant to worry about it even more,' Jeff Gordinier wrote in Esquire. 'I go to a restaurant to get away from the awful news for a few hours.' One night, a guest threw the chicken cage across the domed room, declaring that he hadn’t signed up to be lectured by Greenpeace. But that was in itself a satisfying moment of theatre. On only three or four occasions has a diner walked out in disgust."

From "Can Your Stomach Handle a Meal at Alchemist? At the Copenhagen restaurant, diners are served raw jellyfish—and freeze-dried lamb brain served in a fake cranium—while videos about climate change swirl on the ceiling. Is it 'gastronomic opera,' or sensory overload?" (The New Yorker).

Ha ha. It's funny that the climate change propaganda is the most disgusting part.

I had to look up the word "garum," and I found "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Garum/A culinary star in ancient Rome, this fermented fish sauce transforms everything it touches" (Eater)("it has been called the ketchup of the Roman world"). Are we still doing that thing of thinking about Rome all the time?

"Even though electricity demand from A.I. is expected to at least double in the coming years, the efficiency of the technology could increase at an even higher rate...."

"After the mania has calmed down, other incentives kick in,' said Jonathan Koomey, a former scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who is now an independent researcher. 'here is a huge incentive for the industry to become more efficient.' The big tech companies are working on ways to streamline their software, hardware and cooling systems to reduce electricity consumption in their data centers. They are locating computing facilities in northern countries, pulling in cold outdoor air as a coolant to reduce electricity and water use. And they are investing in alternative energy sources. If those efforts are successful, and if we’re smart about how we use A.I., it might eventually offer a lot of environmental bang for the buck."

From "Will A.I. Ruin the Planet or Save the Planet? It’s a notorious energy hog. But artificial intelligence can also foster innovation and discovery, and it could speed the global transition to cleaner power" (NYT).

There's so little attention to this issue. If there were more, though, it would fuel suspicions about the seriousness of the climate change emergency. I see an occasional article like this, which really only says, don't worry, technology will find solutions... which is what is said by people who oppose taking strong action on climate change. 

"I think we have set up an expectation or even an entitlement around comfort such that it makes it really difficult to start to ask people, do you really need to turn up your air conditioning today?..."

"And I think we're increasingly going to see architects and builders trying to rediscover these lost ideas that we used to have about how to design buildings with the climate in mind. You know, how to shade them, how to ventilate them in a more natural way. But I also have talked to some people who say that all of that is not going to be enough. One of them is Daniel Barber, who's an architectural historian who has thought a lot about life after air conditioning, or as he puts it after comfort.... We need to sort of think anew about our relationship to comfort. And are we willing to be uncomfortable some of the time?..."

From today's episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast, "How Air-Conditioning Conquered America."

"The planet is officially on alert for La Niña... scientists declared Thursday. It could have a cooling effect on the ongoing stretch of record global heat...."

"The climate pattern linked to cool Pacific Ocean conditions... can deliver drought conditions in some places and heavy snow in others.... But there is some uncertainty over how this episode of La Niña could play out because it arrives amid over a full year of record average global temperatures and unprecedented ocean surface warmth. Climate scientists will be paying close attention to whether La Niña’s typical global cooling influence plays out as usual.... 'It’s going to be interesting to see how this La Niña intersects with the generally very warm global oceans,' said Nathan Lenssen, a climate scientist at the University of Colorado. 'We’re in really uncharted territory, globally.'.... La Niña typically lasts nine to 12 months but can sometimes last three years...."

WaPo reports.

By the way, the term El Niño originated as a reference to baby Jesus, after fishermen noticed warm water at Christmastime. La Niña doesn't refer to anyone in particular. It's just the opposite of El Niño.

Expect to be instructed time and again that the cooler weather should not be viewed as an easing up of global warming.

"The Vanishing Islands That Failed to Vanish/Low-lying tropical island nations were expected to be early victims of rising seas."

"But research tells a surprising story: Many islands are stable. Some have even grown."

The NYT reports. That's a free-access link, my last of the month. There are many details and diagrams — and beautiful photographs — at the link. It's a complicated phenomenon, so please try to understand it (and don't just guess that the seas are not rising!).

On the day before the solstice, the group "Just Stop Oil" besmirches Stonehenge.

Just stop oil protestors damage Stonehenge 😭
pic.twitter.com/HSQvfWIdNh

— Stonehenge U.K (@ST0NEHENGE) June 19, 2024

The group stresses its moderation: "The orange cornflour we used will soon wash away with the rain, but the urgent need for effective government action to mitigate the catastrophic consequences of the climate and ecological crisis will not."

"The Wisconsin ad doesn’t show Mr. Evers until the end. It focuses on solar projects, which the ad says will power 750,000 homes in the state."

"'Governor Evers is working with the Biden administration to do even more,' the ad’s narrator says as photos are shown of Mr. Evers and Mr. Biden touring a Milwaukee factory last summer. 'Your home value goes up and your energy bill goes down.' The ad concludes with footage of Mr. Evers’s annual State of the State address.... Because Evergreen is technically an issue-advocacy organization, it is prohibited from making an explicit push to vote for Mr. Biden, but the message here is not subtle.... ... Evergreen is seeking to remind voters that something they like — ... using solar power in Wisconsin — is brought to them by the Biden administration. Less than six months out from the presidential election, Mr. Biden has failed to convey that message to voters, leaving supportive outside groups and Democratic governors to do it for him."

From "Climate Group Is Running Ads on Biden Policies in Wisconsin and Michigan/The group, which has ties to Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington, has a $1 million plan for TV spots playing up the president’s record on green power" (NYT).

1. "Mr. Evers" is the unflashy personage who serves as Governor of Wisconsin, Tony Evers. He appears in the last 5 seconds of the ad... in all his low-key glory.

2. $1 million spent on TV ads seems too trivial to be warrant a NYT article. Is it an effort to cheer readers up: $1 million to the rescue? Or is this a gentle raising of the alarm: "Mr. Biden has failed...."? 

"Democratic strategists seem to see climate change as a key political issue only for white liberal elites and assume that other groups, like Black voters, are either unaware of or apathetic about it...."

"During his speech at Morehouse, [Biden] mentioned the climate crisis explicitly only in a stray line about 'heeding your generation’s call to a community free of gun violence and a planet free of climate crisis and showing your power to change the world.' There’s a better way to talk about the issue, one that might galvanize Black voters... focus[ing] on how the Biden administration is investing in clean energy hubs, green work force development, tax credits for home improvement measures and community grants. Mr. Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act earmarked roughly $2 billion for community-level climate justice initiatives, such as grants for green technology and reducing the health risks from heat and pollution that have ravaged Black communities, and there’s more money waiting to be doled out...."

Writes Jerel Ezell, in "Biden Underestimates How Much Black Americans Care About This Issue" (NYT).

So, the "better way to talk about" climate change to black voters — instead of talking about "a planet free of climate crisis" — is to let them know there are billions of dollars "waiting to be doled out" to their specific communities. And that's "how much black Americans care" — they care about the money that might be doled out to them. That's what it says in the article.

At this point, they're only asking you to suffer physically for the sake of the environment.

But you really ought to take that shower in "warm or room-temperature water — or even cold water"

I'm reading, "Why you should embrace using cold water, almost all the time/Heating water gobbles energy, leading to higher utility bills and more planet-warming emissions" in The Washington Post.

If I keep the house at 62° or lower all winter, may I still take the hot bath I think need to restore heat to my inner core? Or will the failure to take cold showers count as a sin henceforward? 

Look at the backhanded treatment of baths:

Instead of taking long hot showers or baths that can dehydrate your skin, dermatologists recommend showers of no more than 10 minutes, using warm or room-temperature water — or even cold water — which is less drying to skin.

They can't time limit a bath. Unlike a shower, the water usage is complete at the point when you get in (unless you stay in so long you need to reheat it with new water). But maybe you know the number of minutes it takes to fill your bath, so you could take a "10 minute" bath. Would that fill your bathtub? I ask Siri to set my timer to 15 minutes, and of course, I use hot water. Maybe I should only fill the bath 2/3 of the way — with room-temperature water — for the planet. I'd rather take a 3-minute shower and have it hot.

Taking away our hot showers and baths? It feels as if you want to deprive us of the most basic pleasures of living in the modern world.

"But Lake Manly is no illusion. Instead, it’s more like a ghost from Death Valley’s prehistoric past..."

"... temporarily resurrected by the fast-changing, climate-churning present. Thanks to the record-setting rain that has washed over California during the last six months, Lake Manly — which dried up thousands of years ago — has reformed on the floor of Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America. This unlikely and exceedingly rare comeback is a message from the warming climate, which baked the region in a years-long megadrought and has now flooded it with rain...."

From "California rains resurrect a long-dead lake in dry Death Valley" (WaPo).

Beautiful photographs at the link. But you're warned not to enjoy any of this. You can't abstract beauty out of its horrible context, the apocalypse we live in today. Experience it as "churning-churning." It's a "ghost" from the human-free past delivering a "message" that we're sinful and selfish... right when you're thinking of piling into the gas-powered F-150 and barreling across the continent to take a gander at this Lake Manly.

"Shabbat is one of the most radical things you could do. One of the reasons we have a climate crisis right now is a product of disconnection..."

"... the result of undervaluing life, especially nonhuman life. Shabbat is a time of remembering we’re not machines; we get to be human with all other life. That kind of connection is what powers environmental and climate movements."

Says Rabbi Laura Bellows of Dayenu, "an organization mobilizing the United States’ Jewish community to confront the climate crisis," quoted in "Why reviving a 2,600-year-old spiritual practice made my life better" (WaPo).

This essay, by Michael J. Coren, begins with a focus on his own psychological wellbeing, as the essay title suggests, but it quickly devolves into a discussion of climate change, replete with suggestions of compulsory observance of the Sabbath:

"Cats and dogs have an outsize carbon footprint, mostly because of their carnivorous diet."

"If the pet food industry, which mainly feeds dogs and cats, were a country, it would rank as the 60th-highest greenhouse gas emitter, equivalent to the Philippines. Rabbits, by contrast, leave a minimal pawprint. They eat small amounts of hay and otherwise discarded vegetables. Their waste can be used as fertilizer in gardens...."

From "Why you should consider bunnies as your next pet/'It’s like having a vegan cat'" (WaPo).

From the comments, from someone who said she had a rabbit as a pet: